Recently I mentioned I was reading a book that I intended to make a post about. I had also said how it was brilliant in the beginning but I was keeping my expectations low for the next chapters, which tackled periods of the Greek history many foreigners like to view controversially as an MO.
We have talked about Roderick Beaton before in the blog. An anon had asked me what I thought of the way he viewed Greek identity, here's a link to my answer.
Should one read his book "The Greeks; A Global History"? Sure. Preferably a beginner in the later stages of Greek history. The truth is that a Greek or anybody well-versed in Byzantine and Modern Greek history is going to find the book lacking in those areas. But here's what you can expect from this book.
The big deal about it is that it is the first or most notable English attempt to fit all of Greek history (starting from the Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations and ending with the Coronavirus) into about 500 pages. It is written in a very accessible manner and I would even say beautifully, except the beauty somehow progressively decreases a little, as if he was losing momentum chapter after chapter.
The curious thing is that Beaton is not another case of a classicist who worships Ancient Greeks and is grossed out by the existence of Modern Greeks. On the contrary, he is a unicorn, meaning a historian of Byzantine and Modern Greek history and he is not specialized in the ancient history which, for one, explains why he decided to follow a wholistic approach but on the other hand makes it odd that the early chapters are so much better than the later ones.
Now, a megamind here may say "well it's because ancient history is bEtTER dUh". No. This was not the root of the problem. I will explain but I have to describe first his mindset and intent for writing this book.
What I called "brilliant" about this book the other day and honestly the very highlight was, believe it or not, the prologue to the Greeks in the Greek edition. I am making this post because it single-handedly was the finest example of how a historian or any foreigner messing with other people's cultures and history should approach the descendants who have that heritage. There is a shitload of western Europeans and Americans who should be taking lessons from Beaton.
In the Greek edition, Beaton keeps the standard English prologue as well (so there are two prologues, one for all readers and the other for Greeks in specific) because he explains it is only fair that Greek readers should have an idea of how he introduces them to the rest of the world. I found this very considerate and thoughtful. It should be the obvious thing to do but we all know that too few (maybe only Beaton) have the quality of character it takes in order to think in this way.
The Greek prologue is in fact so good that I thought it should be included in the general English edition too because the way the author and historian addresses Greeks about his work and their history would be far more illuminating to other readers than some dry name- and event-dropping in the book's chapters.
In short, in the prologue he says that his intent is not that Greeks should be convinced that they need to read his book or adopt his perspective, he pays tribute to the Greek historians who attempted a similar wholistic approach but their works never became famous due to the language barrier and the prejudice of the west against Modern Greeks, which he confirms that it often reaches "vulgar extremes" and he exposes that very few historians in the west know or study the historical events and concepts of the Greek history that have given Modern Greeks a footing to claim historical continuity. Finally, he warns Greeks of how little of this is understood at all outside Greece and thus ultimately his intent is to present Greek history in a way that explains why the Greek civilization is so discussed, how it has influenced the world and simultaneously to suspend the knee-jerk reaction of scepticism the foreigners have by narrating the story in a low-profile, scientific and neutral way.
That prologue was a 100/5. His approach was totally fine with me. Besides, I too wanted an objective narration. His strategy was to narrate Greek history based on the history of the usage of the Greek language, which for me was the absolute obvious way to go about it and I found it odd that he sort of felt like explaining himself and that a few (only a few, I stress this) Greek readers took some mild issue with it. To me, it is obvious that the language is one of the biggest elements of ethnic heritage, let alone that for the Greeks it is the absolute hugest one since the borders of their existence and their influence have changed so much throughout the millenias. What will bring people that have been through four empires and hundreds other smaller political entities more together than the common language?! Nowadays, there is no ethnic group that speaks Greek as a mother tongue besides the Greeks. Therefore, the language is the ultimate factor for the Greek ethnic identity and I am baffled why this is viewed as a "novel approach". What else could it be in its stead? (Obviously, this doesn't mean that one cannot be Greek because they are 3rd gen Greek expat and do not know the language, I am just saying that it is typically the main factor, not the unique one.)
THE PROS
Apart from the prologue, Beaton tries, not very successfully (but it's the effort that matters), to dedicate roughly the same number of pages to all stages of Greek history. Most chapters are about 30 pages long, give or take, although the "give" ones are more frequent in the beginning and the "take" in the end.
Most importantly, he does not say anything critically different from whatever you will read in a Greek telling of history. Even though he sounds neutral, often critical and unimpressed, he almost never defies the Greek perspective of things. He certainly lacks one certain enthusiasm that in a Greek ethnic narrative would maybe cause scepticism to foreign readers but he never deviates from the very substance of what Greeks claim, therefore giving a somewhat cold, scientific affirmative nod to them. As an example, he treats the Ancient Macedonian royalty as evidently Greek and the Macedonian peasants as "para-Greeks" or fast hellenizing peoples and specifies that they spoke Greek dialects at least four centuries before Alexander. He talks about two types of Greek receptions towards Macedonians, the very opposing ones like that of Demosthenes and the very loving ones like that of Isocrates. That was a nice point to deepen in the reasons and motives behind each one's stance but he fails to go deeper. Regarding the name issue nowadays, he compares sarcastically the hatred Demosthenes had with the modern patriotism regarding the "Greekness" of Macedonia, however also clarifies how Slavic populations reached the area almost a millenium later so that any claim made to Macedonian heritage by them is absurd. Then, he is clear from the beginning of the medieval narrative that while Greeks called themselves Romans, the Eastern Roman was a new Greek culture with which Greeks reinvented themselves and it was ultimately not a real Roman empire. He calls it "Byzantine" to distinguish it and then he also occasionally calls Byzantines "Romans", always with those quote marks of disbelief. Despite sounding very distanced half of the time, he simultaneously gives various examples of Greeks identifying as Greeks (Hellenes) in various places in the world, from the mid era of the Byzantine empire up to the Ottoman era. Therefore, he largely agrees with the Greek perspective in those things, despite keeping a "scientific distance". All of his claims, evey single statement is always sourced in this book.
Some Greek readers complained that he speaks about Hellenized Greek speakers more than for Greeks. I personally consider this totally valid and expected from a study in the Greek - often imperial and often linked to liguistics - history. But it's not accurate that he talks more about Hellenized foreigners, he still talks about Greeks more.
He obviously treats Ancient, Koine and Modern Greek as one language, he doesn't even bargain on that and he seems to be equally fascinated by both ancient and modern forms of it. After all, it's the language he defines as the very essence of Greek identity.
MIXED / CONS
The images used were okay but surely there are better ones available.
I think my biggest issue with the book is that although I understood his approach thanks to the prologue, I still think that he failed a little in its execution. He just seems to be fascinated by some points in Greek history that do not agree at all with the points that I find most fascinating. This could be subjective or it could be that I view Greek history from an ethnic perspective like he said and he from a global perspective, however I felt very validated when a foreign reader in some reviews expressed his disappointment at the extremely rushed, totally cold presentation of the Greek Revolution, because this was the part he wished to learn about. Beaton makes it clear again and again that what interests and fascinates him the most is the ability Greeks had to spread and prosper in empires or other places in the world by accidentally or consciously spreading their culture. Based on this mindset, his disappointment that they were independent yet isolated in their own state compared to being influential despite unfree in the Ottoman empire is somewhat loud. He literally sounds more impressed by a Greek opening a shop in London in the 16th century than by the brutal, desparate battles of the Independence War or WWII, which he doesn't even mention except just the wars overall in passing. That was wild. And I am glad foreign readers were equally baffled. Beaton took so earnestly his intent to find points of convergence between the Greeks and the west or globalism that he ignores major events simply because they were affecting Greeks as an ethnos more. But it's questionable critical thinking in the end. The Greek revolution and the Greek contribution against the Axis powers, for example, did affect the rest of the world much more than a shop or two Greek generals in a French-British battle. He gives several interesting anecdotes but it's a really uneven and peculiar management of the events. Again, he's not being inaccurate (except in a couple of cases), he's just dedicating page space to the oddest of things.
Although he did his best to roughly dedicate equal number of pages to general big eras of Greek history, each of the chapters have an odd pattern of how they are managing their 30 pages. No matter what mindset he followed, there is not any logical way to explain how Greece since 1974 (where nothing big happens apart from the crisis) gets 30 pages when the Independence War gets... five. Five extremely lukewarm ones, where of all of the dozens of historical figures he could talk about, he talks only about three, the one solely because he was a pro-British politician and two other generally acknowledged as the most significant but famously anti-British, so they totally get the short end of his sympathy. There is where I also find the most unacceptable inaccuracy, when he says the "decent" (AKA the best) governor Kapodistrias was assassinated by two political adversaries. Now, that's just false. He was not killed by political adversaries. And he totally "forgets" to mention that both France and the UK have been accused of '''"indulging"''' his assassination. It became worse when I saw that even though he used international sources from historians and scientists for the rest of the book, he used.... the BRITISH AMBASSADOR for the Modern Greece chapters. Like wow. Not Greek but British input. And even if the ambassador is a historian himself, it still doesn't change that above all he is a politician serving his country's interests. Beaton does admit in a few instances faulty deeds from the west or the UK but it is always half-hearted.
Half-hearted are also all the references to the wrongdoings other nations have done to Greeks. In general, other nations are treated very indifferently while Greeks receive both all his fascination but also all his criticism. This makes some sense - it's a book about Greeks after all. But it gets a little odd at times again, like, there is a sentence almost going "thousands of Greeks were slaughtered, anyway" *changes subject* I mean, when you write a book only about the Greeks, I think the readers will allow you some empathy towards them without thinking you are biased from the get go. You can feel for them in other ways that don't always have to do with their "genious adaptability". In the end, despite the 500 pages dedicated to them I think there is too little to be learned about who the Greeks truly are as people (besides super skilled chameleons), their profile, their lifestyle, what makes them ick or smile. It does lack a human approach. And I honestly believe Beaton severely underestimated that foreign readers would in fact be interested in this; decoding their human side.
The other thing I found odd is that he stresses Homer never calls all of Greeks as Hellenes. This is false, right? I was pretty sure he calls all Greeks Hellenes a couple of times and there is even an instance of "Panhellenes" (= all Hellenes). Of course, it's much rarer than the use of Achaeans but it exists. I read the Iliad recently. Am I losing it here?
Much like it happens with the culture and the people, Beaton seems to love the Greek language as well. I read he has some specialty in linguistics. Since it is the foundation of his approach, I wished he had attempted to explain to readers who have zero exposure to Greek, what he finds fascinating in it and how he explains the tremendous grip this language historically had to others and how he justifies his conviction that even now Greek has the potential to keep influencing people in the future. I would appreciate a chapter solely about a linguistic analysis. Because this is what he seems to unequivocally love the most, so again it is like he was too afraid to be too emotional. I am not saying he should be sentimental to the point of being inaccurate, not at all. I welcomed the criticism, especially about the trademark Greek political stupidity throughout millenias. But I think he failed a little to make readers connect with Greeks in the way he so wanted.
THE TAKEAWAY
With all its flaws, it's probably still the best if not the only Western wholistic approach to Greek history. Despite the few hiccups here and there, the book is mostly very well sourced out and contains quite a few little known interesting facts. It is beautifully written. The Byzantine and especially the Modern chapters are underwhelming, however it is your best chance to make a first dive in the whole of the Greek civilization in one single book. I'd say, read it and if there is anything you found intriguing in those chapters, you can search more sources, even from a Greek perspective (as Beaton and his sources confirm that a sober Greek perspective doesn't deviate much from the neutral truth) and I guarantee you it will only get more interesting from there.
Rate: an overall 3.75 / 5, with its highlights deserving a 5 and its lowest moments deserving a 2.5.
*I just saw he also wrote a separate book specifically about Modern Greece. I am interested to see how his approach differs or is maintained there.
Rustlers, pirates, traders, and raiders in the Iliad and the Odyssey
[by Roderick Beaton]
In both epics, the main story of heroic words and deeds is punctuated by little vignettes drawn from everyday activities such as farming, hunting, or seafaring. These would have been part of the familiar experience of the poems’ audiences. Known as ‘epic similes’, many of these vignettes seem to open up windows that enable us to look into the lives and experience of ordinary Greeks living in the eighth century BCE. [...]
Even in time of peace, in both poems a typical activity is to go rustling somebody else’s livestock. In the Iliad the worldly-wise old windbag Nestor tells the story of how he first won his spurs in a glorified cattle-raid that blew up into a mini-war when things got out of hand. Odysseus, while still a boy, had been sent by his father from Ithaca to the mainland to reclaim three hundred stolen sheep. And at the end of the Odyssey, when he has killed the suitors who had been besieging his wife and depleting his stores, the hero knows only one way to begin to recoup his losses:
I have to go on raids, to steal replacements
for all the sheep those swaggering suitors killed,
and get the other Greeks to give me more,
until I fill my folds. [Od. 24.357–360]
Activities such as these seem to be taken for granted by poet and audience alike, because they elicit no comment. Another is trading by sea, something that we know Greeks were once again doing on a large scale by the eighth century BCE. Usually, in the Odyssey, sea traders are depicted as Phoenicians. They are usually also devious tricksters—though hardly worse in this respect than the hero himself, Odysseus ‘of many wiles’. As in many other societies of later times, trade is presented as no occupation for a gentleman, still less for an epic hero. But Odysseus, that master of disguise, is several times permitted to pretend to be a trader—and even the goddess Athena is not above doing the same on occasion. Often the line between legitimate exchange of goods and piracy or plunder appears to be easily crossed. The Cyclops, the savage giant with one eye, shortly before he starts to eat his uninvited guests for dinner, suspiciously demands of Odysseus, newly arrived at his cave:
Where did you come from
across the watery depths? Are you on business,
or roaming round without a goal, like pirates,
who risk their lives to bring disaster
to other people? [Od. 9.252–256]
Although heroes on the battlefield are expected to have higher motives, the force that drives ordinary people in the real world of the eighth century BCE is the brute reality of hunger and the fear of starvation. In another of his disguises, this time as a decrepit old beggar, Odysseus gives voice to a motivation that listeners to the poem would surely have had no difficulty in recognising:
There is no way to hide a hungry belly.
It is insistent, and the curse of hunger
is why we sail across the relentless seas,
and plunder other people. [Od. 17.288–290]
– Roderick Beaton, The Greeks: A Global History (Basic Books, 2021); the Odyssey quotes are from Emily Wilson’s translation (W.W. Norton, 2018)
Found this article and i am curious about this British professor. He has knowledge of Greece's history and politics in detail, but the theme he presented he Hellenism confused me a bit.
What i mean is, is he one of those who believe that Hellenism is not bound only with ethnicity but woth how many people speak it? Could be wrong but he dragged too much about the expansion of greek language and the ways.
I read his interview and an older one with great interest. I agree with him to some considerable degree but not in everything. He says that an ethnicity is a human concept, which is technically true, both for Greeks as well as all other ethnicities. He clarifies that he believes the same for all ethnicities including his own, so it's fair enough.
It is not the same DNA or an exact same ancestral place of origin but the presumption that one has that this is the case and that a certain culture is part of their identity. This is the widely accepted definition of ethnicity, so it's not Beaton's idea.
Given how much Greeks spread their cultural influence and how seamlessly they incorporated foreign cultural elements to their own identity, it makes it twice as hard to create borders / gatekeep hellenism on a historical level. I mean, Greeks were an extroverted people: travelling, sailing, migrating, communicating their culture. Thus Roderick Beaton means the hellenized people of the Alexandrian, the Roman and the Byzantine Empires and all places of Greek influence. Maybe even the Ottoman empire, for some of the Christian Orthodox populations only. The Greek element was primary in the first three and considerable in some parts of the fourth, thus hellenizing some people from originally non-ethnic Greek families. In short, Beaton considers all the heavily hellenized people of those empires - the Greek speakers - as Greeks, who enjoyed access but also contributed to the Greek heritage. The hellenism as a strict definition of the Greek nation living or coming from the modern Greek state's borders is a very new concept after all.
Besides, Greeks have gone through so much that it is true that there is nothing more robust to rely on for their self-identification than the Greek language. Many things have changed but the language hasn’t (by comparison) and it is unique to the people who identify as Greek. Beaton is right in my opinion to use the language as the axis of his study.
Of course, Beaton does not mean people who learned a word or two or Greek is their fifth language or read Hades and Persephone fanfiction as Greeks. He means people for whom Hellenism had a pivotal presence and (positive) impact on their entire life, shaping of character and perhaps sense of identity, regardless of the origin of their ancestors. Then again, he almost calls himself a Greek and basically says "we" at some point when he refers to Greeks lol, but oh well he's an academic who has spent all his life studying the Greek language and complete history, and he comes here every year or something. So... he might as well feel like that, I guess? Not as a Greek by descent obviously but as a participant in the heritage, who has earned this right to the participation with a lifetime's dedication to it.
Having said that, I haven't read his book so I can't be entirely sure he doesn't fall into the trap of appropriation. It's interesting though that his book is one of the very first now that span 3000 years: the book starts from the Bronze Age and ends with coronavirus! Some more sceptical reviews in Goodreads say that he didn't avoid the typical Western decline of historiographic quality once he moves from Roman to Byzantine era and onwards (weird, given that he is a Byzantinologist), however for a westerner it's still very novel to explore Hellenism through a unifying perspective and without picking out his favourite type of Greeks, and for this alone I have this book in my wishlist. It might not be perfect but it is a start.
Imagine if the point of the book is: "Modern Greeks are Greeks because we are all Greeks anyway" XD eh hopefully not!
Title: The Greeks : A Global History
Author: Roderick Beaton
Genre: World History
Goodreads Summary :
More than two thousand years ago, the Greek city-states, led by Athens and Sparta, laid the foundation for much of modern science, the arts, politics, and law. But the influence of the Greeks did not end with the rise and fall of this classical civilization. As historian Roderick Beaton illustrates, over three millennia Greek speakers produced a series of civilizations that were rooted in southeastern Europe but again and again ranged widely across the globe.
In The Greeks, Beaton traces this history from the Bronze Age Mycenaeans who built powerful fortresses at home and strong trade routes abroad, to the dramatic Eurasian conquests of Alexander the Great, to the pious Byzantines who sought to export Christianity worldwide, to today’s Greek diaspora, which flourishes on five continents. The product of decades of research, this is the story of the Greeks and their global impact told as never before.
Review :
Greece, Greek History, and Greek Culture have always been meaningful to me as my ancestry is Greek. And years ago, when this first came out, I couldn't help but pick it up thinking someday I'd get to know the full span of Greek history. So, I finally got around to reading this book that jams over 5000+ years of history into 466 pages.
I have some complicated feelings about it.
I kind of felt like I jammed a 12 week Greek history course into a singular reading experience. There was a lot to go over and not a whole lot of time to do it in. Each chapter documents a single era of Greek history and each chapter could (and most of these eras do) have entire books written about them.
I did like having a general overview, which kind of gives it a sampler platter vibe where you can dig into other sources if you like to learn more. But on the other hand, I'm grateful that I did have some knowledge of Greek history going in, because sometimes the author supposes you have at least a basic knowledge of events.
I think the other problem is that having to go through each era so quickly, it feels like a dense tracking of which empire took over when and the political elements that led to who was governing when. It also didn't leave a whole lot of room for commentary on culture nor did it spend that much time on individuals that lived in each time period. The modern era felt so rushed that I didn't really get a sense of what Greece has been like post-19th century.
Probably the best portion of the book was the chapter on Alexander the Great, because the text was able to take the time and really look him and his life and the world he was conquering.
Overall, it wasn't a bad book, and it's relatively easy to read -- though the writing is a little bit text book. It's nice for anyone who wants a general overview of a huge chunk of history. But if you want more depth on any one era, I'm sure there are a lot more books out there on those individual subjects.
I ask nothing else but to speak simply, to be granted this grace.
Because our song has become overloaded with so many kinds of
music that slowly it is sinking
and our art has been overlaid so heavily that the gold has eaten
away its face
and it is time we spoke the few words we have because tomorrow
our souls set sail.
George Seferis, from “An Old Man on the Riverbank,” in A Levant Journal, trans. by Roderick Beaton (Ibis Editions, 2007)
